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Messrs Davidson and Deering proceeding to view Turtle Spearing Demonstration near Lindeman Island, c 1931

Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

The first European to explore the area was Captain James Cook who travelled through the area on his journey up the eastern coast of Australia in 1770. He passed through Whitsunday passage, a narrow channel which lies between the mainland coast, South Molle and Daydream Islands to the west and Dent, Whitsunday, Hook and Hayman Islands to the east, on Sunday 4 June which happened to be Whit Sunday (the seventh Sunday after easter) – hence the name of the area.

Cook probably sighted Lindeman but he certainly didn’t name it. It wasn’t until the 1870s that Captain Bedwell, charting the Whitsunday waters in the Royal Navy HMS Virago, named the island after his sub-lieutenant, George Sidney Lindeman. Although other islands in the Whitsundays were settled during the 19th century, Lindeman remained unsettled because the local Aborigines saw it as a vital part of their fishing

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Mr Mick Busuttin coming down Coconut Palm head-first, Brampton Island, c 1931

Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

Barrier Miner
Sat 28 Jan 1933

Tourists to Great Barrier Reef
Dr Macgillivray Relates His Experiences

[…] Mr Busuttin, a Maltese, has two married sons who are very hardy specimens, especially Mick, the elder. Mick was engaged at one time in capturing crocodiles for the various zoological gardens in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney. It is nothing for him to defend himself single handed against a shark and kill it with a knife.

He knows all passages and the islands intimately and ran with consumate ease barefooted over the sharp rocks and stone and coral reef. He is stall, strong, and wiry and climbs a coconut tree with his hands and feet and can come down head first. Some little time ago an airman who was engaged in an aerial survey on the Barrier Reef tried to emulate him. He climbed the tree all right, but came down head first

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Messrs J W Davidson, Commissioner of Railways and Hastings Deering of Sydney, show a fine catch of fish, Carlisle Island, c 1931

Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

The Central Queensland Herald
Thursday 9 March 1939

Death of Mr J. W. Davidson
48 Years in Service

Exactly a year after his retirement from the position of Commisioner for Railways, which he held for 19 years, Mr James Walker Davidson died at his home tonight after a long spell of ill health. He had been an inmate of a private hospital for several weeks. He returned home a few days ago, but suffered a fatal relapse.

Mr Davidson was born in Glasgow and came to Australia as a youth in 1890. He entered the railway service as a junior clerk and made rapid progress through the service under Commisioners Thallon and Evans, and on the retirement of Commissioner Evans was appointed to the head of the service. He was regarded as one of the most able railway administrators in Australia.

Speaking from Mackay tongiht, the Premier (Mr Smith) expressed

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Messrs Davidson and Deering and two men from Lindeman Island who went spearing turtles, c 1931

Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

One of the most fearsome Chelonians around is the alligator snapping turtle, Macroclemys temminckii, which is the biggest freshwater turtle in North America. It can grow to 2.5 feet long, can weigh as much as 200 pounds, and has powerful jaws, a sharply-hooked beak, nasty bearlike claws and a muscular tail. The alligator snapping turtle does eat some aquatic plants, but it’s mostly a carnivore that dines on a variety of smaller creatures — fish, frogs, snakes, worms, clams, crayfish and even other turtles.

The alligator snapping turtle catches prey by way of a fiendishly clever evolutionary adaptation: an appendage to its tongue that, when wriggled, looks an awful lot like a worm, according to the Saint Louis Zoo. A fish who gets fooled by the turtle’s tongue will swim right into range of the hungry predator’s jaws.

Queensland State Archives Image ID 928

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